Conventionally, various methods have been used in order to sterilize disposable or reusable medical equipment. Of such methods, methods of using steam or dry heat have been widely used, but are disadvantageous in that they cannot be used when target articles to be sterilized are heat- or steam-sensitive.
Also, there is a method of using ethylene oxide (EtO) gas. However, this method is disadvantageous in that, because toxic residues may remain on sterilized target articles and cause serious harm to patients who use the sterilized target articles, it is necessary to perform an additional process of removing such toxic residues remaining on the sterilized target articles, which requires excessive expenses and time.
As one method for solving this disadvantage, a method of performing sterilization in such a way as to bring a target sterilization article, which will be sterilized, into contact with hydrogen peroxide vapor in advance and to generate an active species from hydrogen peroxide, and decomposing and removing the hydrogen peroxide remaining on the target article using plasma and non-toxic products was proposed in Korean Pat. No. 10-0132233, entitled “Hydrogen Peroxide Plasma Sterilization System.”
In the above-described low-temperature plasma sterilization system, a device for supplying hydrogen peroxide employs a capsule-type cassette system in which a predetermined amount of hydrogen peroxide solution is injected into a capsule. A cassette is transferred to an injector valve assembly and is moved to an evaporator due to the pressure difference that is caused by the vacuum in the sterilization chamber, and thus the liquid contained in the capsule is evaporated into vapor and is then supplied to a sterilization reactor.
However, the above-described method is disadvantageous in that, after a sterilization process is performed ten times using one capsule-type cassette having ten capsules (for example, one capsule is used for a single sterilization process), the existing cassette must be replaced with a new cassette into which ten capsules are loaded. Furthermore, the above-described device for quantitatively supplying a very small amount of liquid is disadvantageous in that the structure thereof is very complicated and the price thereof is high.
Accordingly, in order to solve the above-described problems, a device for supplying a liquid for plasma generation, which can eliminate the inconvenience of exchanging a cassette, can reduce the manufacturing cost because the structure thereof is simple, and can quantitatively and automatically supply a very small amount of hydrogen peroxide solution for plasma generation, was previously submitted by the present applicant, and was registered (Korean Pat. No. 10-396195).
The above-described device for supplying a liquid for plasma generation is configured such that the hydrogen peroxide solution is quantitatively supplied to a reaction container while a piston reciprocates in response to the operation of a motor. However, the above-described device is also disadvantageous in that the structure thereof is complicated and in that the liquid is not supplied in a quantitative and accurate manner.
Furthermore, as shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, a device 10 for supplying a liquid for plasma generation, which is configured such that a hydrogen peroxide solution, which is drained from a hydrogen peroxide solution container, is collected in a separate tank 12, the collected hydrogen peroxide solution is drained from the tank 12 to a separate basket 20 using a solenoid valve 14, and the hydrogen peroxide solution collected in the basket 20 is quantitatively supplied to a reaction container using a solenoid valve 22, was proposed.
However, in the above-described construction, the hydrogen peroxide solution is quantitatively supplied to the basket using the solenoid valves, so that, when an electrical problem occurs, there is the concern that the hydrogen peroxide solution may not be quantitatively supplied to the basket.
Furthermore, there are problems in that a separate measurement sensor for detecting whether the hydrogen peroxide solution is quantitatively supplied to the basket must be provided, and in that the construction of the device becomes complicated because the opening and closing of the solenoid valves must he controlled in response to the detecting operation of the measurement sensor.